


Sparrowhawk

by jenni3penny



Series: In Time [6]
Category: NCIS
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-18
Updated: 2020-04-18
Packaged: 2021-03-01 17:54:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,224
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23721193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jenni3penny/pseuds/jenni3penny
Summary: Next in the 'In Time' series. A precocious young pilot-in-training and the guy who will do anything he can to keep her in the air. Curtiss Airfield, New York.
Relationships: Jethro Gibbs/Jacqueline "Jack" Sloane
Series: In Time [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1701886
Comments: 19
Kudos: 40





	1. One

**New York, United States, c. Late 1930s**   
**Curtiss Airfield & New York Methodist, Long Island.**

****

"You ever been sailing, Ace?" She surprised and stunned him, bewitched by the casual way she said it as she put an elbow to the wing and dropped her chin onto the break of her palm. “ _Really_ sailing? How does it feel?”

The fresh smile she gave him was full of bounce and bright brown eyes, a whole heap of supposed innocence directed his way. He purposely stepped away from her inquisition, putting distance between himself and how sweet she looked with her hair waved loose and all curls. She was wearing the gloves he’d found for her a month before, the light camel brown making her eyes go an even lighter amber.

"Is it like bein' upstairs but heavier?" she asked after him and pointed upward, raising her voice as he curved around the end of the broad wing. The wind tugged at her words and cast them in the wrong direction and he turned his glance up at the sky, questioning its strength. If it got too much stronger he’d maybe have to consider scrapping her lesson.

Not that she’d accept that. Hell, he could hear the tantrum now.

"You gotta stop calling me that," he pointed over the wing, stretching up slightly to watch her as she stood straighter and stroked her palm flat to the side of the Seversky. It was their primary two seater, the most reliable training plane at Curtiss, and she looked tiny behind the wing. Her shorter stature was only accentuated when she wore those snub toed brown shoes rather than the heels he’d first seen her in. "A customer hears you and - "

" _I'm_ a customer!" she grumped back, both hands going up to tie her hair back. The pout on her face was warmly familiar and mostly more playful than pained. She tied her hair off her face with a blue scrap ribbon and then gave him a smug look.

" _You_ are a charity case," Gibbs groused as he leaned back, resting up against the radial engine’s cylinder, biting on the grin that wanted to sit on his lips as she ducked under the wing and came at him. She was a feisty little thing, dressed in her slacks and button up, all five and a half feet of her.

" _Charity_?! Then gimme my money back, LJ."

"Can't." He rested back against the plane’s body, letting her toe-to-toe him as much as she could. It only took one good jerk against her thinly braided belt to topple her into his chest. "Lola already drank it."

"Yeah, well, Lola here’s got a drinking problem," she said with affection, patting the plane beside his head as she let him pull her all up the front of him.

"Be nice to her today. You wanna crack up at the end of the line?" he whispered as he lowered his mouth toward her cheek, brushing his lips across it and feeling the sigh moan out of her just as much as he heard it.

Her eyes slimmed a little, tongue wetting along her bottom lip before she ran her teeth over it. "The day I crack up you're gonna be cryin’."

He avoided the commentary at first, kissing her hard to distract himself from the one worry he couldn’t manage to shake - she certainly didn’t need to mention it. Every time he put her up in a pilot seat he questioned his own judgment and the decision to train her in anything at all. Most mornings he told himself over his first cup of coffee that he’d never let her up in the air again, just to keep her safe and sound on the ground…

That usually lasted about as long as it took her to show up at the airfield, all cheerful brightness and excitement.

He’d _laughed_ every day he’d seen her since the first. Now he couldn’t stop trying to find a way to kiss her four days out of every seven.

The familiarity of her, the closeness of her… He’d felt it from the first day she’d stalked into the hangar and near demanded he start teaching her to fly. It hadn’t just been like he’d already known her, it had been factual. He physically _knew_ her, he knew the smell of her and sound of her ‘hmmph’ when he said something she disagreed with. He knew just when she’d squint before giving him a verbal slap, and the smell of her hair, the taste of her tongue as she pulled from a kiss and just the laugh off her lips…

She had a freckle three fingers down under her left breast and he didn’t know how to tell her that he knew it was there despite her having never, _never_ , been naked near him. _Yet_.

He already knew what sounds she made when he slipped his mouth around her nipple but he sure as hell hadn’t made it past the third button down on her shirt either.

"Only if you take Lola with you," he kissed just under her ear, the words turned down the side of her neck. " _That’ll_ make me cry."

He’d expected the jab to the gut to be harder but she’d pulled the punch slightly, making him grunt into laughter just before she slapped his arm too. He kept her tugged tight even as she tried to wriggle away from him, both hands shoving at him playfully. Her laughter was half mangled by a yelp as he started tickling her along the side and that’s when the slaps really gained their strength. When she started to lift her knee he reflexively loosened his hold on her.

"Why're you such a beast?" she finally shunted away, leaving him leaned happily back against the plane with a smug grin.

"They trained me that way." His perfunctory answer followed after her as she stepped down the length of the wing, her gloved left hand sliding its length. He took the time to appreciate her from behind, swallowing hard as he stuffed his hands into his pockets. He lifted his head and noted that the wind had died down slightly, exhaling slowly. "We flying today or not?"

"Gonna say you're sorry for that charity dig?" she asked to her left, not entirely turning and only allowing him to see the cuteness of her profile. She was ageless, it seemed. Widowed for near ten years and she still looked like a fresh-faced bride, young and innocent. At least until he got to look into her eyes, that darkness all knowing and so familiar.

"Gonna keep me alive long enough to regret it?"

Her grin was obvious even before she turned and slightly bounced on her toes. "You got a deal, Ace. Apology _expected_."

***

“Sailing’s got nothin’ on that,” he told her as he jerked the aviator cap off and tossed it aside. There was laughter in his voice as he turned and patted his palm to the plane, pleased with how well she’d handled the landing, smooth and even. “Trust me.”

“ _Still_. I’d like to try it someday.”

He grinned at her precociousness, her insatiable curiosity, watching as she pulled herself up from the training seat. Gibbs stepped up flush, leaning into the paneling as she sent herself up and over the side, shoes first. He slapped against her feet, still laughing as she dropped down into the way he was waiting and matched his laughter as her hands clamped onto his shoulders, all of her flush to the front of him. He felt her jolt hard as his hands curved her waist, the entire frame of her striking still as she dug his shirt up in her fists.

He didn’t feel what she was feeling until he caught sight of her eyes and then it struck him so hard, so sudden, all encompassing. They had been there in that movement before, over and over again. The same movement, the same two people…

“Whoa,” she whispered and near panicked, pressing on his shoulders. He felt her confusion in the way she pressed him away but tucked closer at once, her body up against his. “Gibbs?”

He nodded as his conscious brain tried to catch up to the surprise memories that were flicking through his head, none of them known but all of them including her familiar body sliding off a... off a horse, not a plane, into his hands as they curled at her waist. Each and every one of them including the moment when she looked up at him with those gorgeous brown eyes, jaw high and trust in her body as she stretched up the front of him.

Every face was hers, lovely and soft with a smile. Her hair changed with each memory, loose and wild once, up and perfectly tamed another. Her clothing, the horse, each memory shifted into another and stacked up on top of themselves until he felt her dig him suddenly closer with shaken worry.

He swallowed as she stared at him in startled confusion, nodding supportively to try and calm her concern. “You… that’s _not_ the first time.”

“No, it’s not. It’s all jumbled up, though.”

“Horses.” At least three different horses, at least… A stocky and furious pony, a thick legged mammoth, another one sleek and cool.

“But they’re all different.” She shook her head in sustained frustration as she answered, her hair loosening itself further so that one wave of blonde pulled loose. “But it’s still _always_ you.”

He smiled reflexively, couldn’t keep himself from it while he loosened the ribbon. He pulled it carefully, breathing out slowly as he tugged it free. “It’s always you, Little Flea.”

Her eyes flared even rounder at the nickname, a gulp going down her throat. “We are crackin’ up, Ace. Nothing about it makes sense.”

She swallowed hard again, fingers ribbing against the fabric of his shirt as she distracted herself purposely. He enjoyed the touch silently, reveled in the nearness of her as she relaxed closer into him and teased at his buttons. One of her shoulders shrugged lamely. “Low oxygen?”

“Sure, we’ll say that,” he agreed, still smirking though utterly confused. Her face was scared but also curious, excited, and he wouldn’t purposely feed her fear. If she was happy to enjoy the mystery of it then so was he, for awhile anyhow. It got him close to her again, closer than he had been. Another shrug rippled over his shoulders as he lifted the ribbon and brushed it against his nose. “That why you smell like a stable?”

Her eyes widened at his teasing and she shoved hard at his chest, a blush riding her cheekbones as she watched him, “I do not. Get off me.”


	2. Two

He gave the stranger stepping away from the window a slacked smile, the movement rote as he took the man's place. Both his elbows hit the counter when he realized it was one of her closest friends at the triage desk, his body leaning farther forward than was likely decent. “Hey, Grace. Cracker Jack here?”

Grace just shot him a smirk and turned a look over her shoulder and back. “She just ran upstairs. You can keep me company, though.”

“Think she’ll be long? I gotta get back soon.”

“She’s not the only good girl in Brooklyn, ya know?” the nurse answered, brow up. He watched her eyes spark on the tease as she picked up her coffee and slacked back in her chair. The desk was quiet on a Thursday morning and Grace was safe, easy. She'd been the reason Jack had ever gotten the guts to show her face at the airfield to begin with, he was sure of it. He adored teasing her and he equally appreciated how much she mentored the younger woman.

Gibbs purposely panned his features, giving her a droll look, “I live in Queens.”

“Hiya.” The greeting just barely preceded the tug against the back of his jacket and he turned with a grin, leaning back against the counter as she pressed up into him. Gibbs let her kiss him, enjoying the way she had to lift up on her toes to chastely press her lips to his.

God, she smelled good.

His arm caught her in before she could skirt away, closing her in tighter to his side while she wedged file folders between them and lifted her sharp jaw. “I got a phone call this morning.”

“You came all the way to Redhook to tell me about a phone call?” Her tease was warm and inviting as she kissed his cheek and he could get used to being the center of her attentive flirtation, especially when she was obviously enjoying it.

“Jack, look, it was Vi Gentry.”

She shoved against his chest suddenly, her shoulders slanting back as her chin went down and her dark eyes hardened on him. Scrutiny shaded her face darker as she looked at him, breathing in strongly through her nose before she blinked. “What’d you do?”

“I told her that I was about to put you in the Sparrowhawk next week.” The news surprised her further, widening her eyes though they seemed to go glittering toward black. “That’s a single seater, sweetheart. She says if you land it clean then you can go fly with the 99s. She’ll vouch for your spot.”

“You… _why_?”Anguish made her features flatten out, negating any other emotion as she just stared at him in confused surprise.

“Because you’re a _pilot_. Why wouldn’t I?” he asked defensively, feeling her wince slightly in his arms as he had said it. He wouldn’t apologize for saying it, not when it was true. She was a damn fine pilot, patient and smooth, a light touch, delicate. She landed the Seversky so expertly in comparison to some of his other students.

“No, I mean… no. I _can’t_.”

He blinked in confusion. “Excuse me?”

“I’m sorry, I can’t.” She looked genuinely devastated as she spoke and that piqued his confusion, drew him closer to the strangled quiet of her voice.

Gibbs stroked against her hip, trying to suss out her avoidance. “ _Jacqueline_.”

“Honey, I gotta get back to work. I’ll stop in after, okay?” she nodded, kissing him sharply before she used both hands to shunt away from him and step back. She moved quickly, nimbly hitting the door that was meant for staff only and ducking away from him before he could really get a hold on her.

“Jack?!”

***

“Tell me why you shut him down.”

“I can barely afford to sleep and eat and fly, right?” Jack shrugged off in answer, half ignoring the intensive way Grace was watching her pull a sweater on as their shift ended. “What makes him think I can afford to run off and - ”

“Do what you love?” the older of the two interjected imperiously, shooting a look between them as she reached for her own jacket. "Yeah, how dare he try to help you out with that?"

A few other members of the staff were getting in between them, everyone on their shift clearing out at the same time. Jack stepped aside and waited patiently, buttoning her sweater up over her shirt while Grace stood her ground and stared the younger women down in aggravation. Jack just laughed to herself as the girls ducked out quickly, scampering from the staff room like scared little mice.

“ _You’re_ not helpin’ me any, y’know?” she added in argument, taking the jacket that the half Italian handed her from the coat rack. “I’m skint. I can’t go.”

Grace rolled her eyes with a flare of exaggeration and a wave of her hand, aiming toward the exit. “Tell him.”

“He’s already only charging me for the gas I burn, Grace. I take up teaching time and he loses money on me as it is.”

The pout of her tone did nothing to assuage the other woman, making her grump a little instead. Grace just shook her head and muttered something to herself as she strung her purse strap onto her shoulder. She shook her head suddenly and looked back up. “Didn’t you say Earhart started the 99s?”

“Yeah… Viola Gentry’s no chump.”

“And if you can fly a plane by yourself then you’re already in? That’s the deal?” Grace's face was full of finality. She shook her head once and shrugged before lifting her hands and dropping them as though in defeat. "Jacqueline, stop being purposely blind. Look what he’s done for you.”

She dropped her shoulders with a sigh of longing, knowing how endearing his actions had been, buttoning her jacket as she finally smirked. “It _is_ sweet, huh?”

Grace snorted a laugh, smiling broadly as she nodded toward the door. “I’m getting cavities as we speak. You're gonna miss the night train, kiddo. Beat it.”

***

"Thought you were just starting to like having me around," she offered as she stepped into the first berth of the large building, finding it littered with parts but empty of an actual plane. All three of his training planes were out on the runway in the evening light, glittering under stars. The hangar was mostly lit, though, and she’d followed the sounds of him banging around. "Now you're running me out?"

The loud clank of metal on metal echoed throughout the hangar and made her jump in surprise as he dropped even more parts from the work table onto the center pile. "Not makin' you go anywhere you don't wanna go. Not that I _could_."

She had expected a bit of petulance, really. And to be fair to him she deserved a little bit of his pout and attitude. He had done something extraordinarily sweet and thoughtful and she had shut him down on it without much reasoning as to why, she knew that. He’d also obviously been cleaning out the hangar for awhile because he’d stripped down to just an oil stained work shirt and denim and it drew her in closer to him despite the racket and ruckus.

" _Jay_ … I didn't mean to make you mad," she whispered, moving forward and past the pile of jacked and broken parts he had made on one of the canvas tarps.

She didn’t have to look up to know that he had heard her, not when she felt his body slump still and his hand dropped onto the workbench in resignation. She kept moving forward despite his obvious annoyance, hoping he wouldn’t shunt her back as she stepped into the broad height of him and wordlessly curled around his middle. She ducked her head under his jaw, rubbing her cheek against the half unbuttoned shirt that smelled like fuel oil. He stayed still, unmoving, but she stayed equally stubborn, cuddling closer even in the face of his frustration. When she turned her face up and brushed her nose against his jaw his right hand rose to her hip and she knew he was coming around, slowly.

"I don't get you, some days. I really don’t," he admitted, voice still angry even while his hand stroked down a little to tease at the small of her back. He kept speaking, jaw up and eyes forward even as he rubbed at the hem of her skirt. "You _love_ flying. I can see it. And you're _good_ , Jack. You're good at it."

Her head lifted in appreciation, lips parted in surprise at his frankness. She sent her tongue across her lips before murmuring, "You think so?"

"You put those weekend Wantagh boys to shame, Sloane. I mean it."

She knew just who he meant, big shouldered rich boys who spent a weekend a month at the airfield. She'd met the lot of them weeks before when working on the books for him in lieu of paying for one of her lessons. They'd all been rowdy and rude, and they'd blatantly disrespected him more than once. The only reason he so patiently kept letting them come around was because the airfield's owner liked the shine of their money stacking up, month by month.

Even then the only time he'd really taken a tone with any of them was when the biggest of the five had perched himself to the corner of the desk she'd been at and refused to move off the accounting book even after she'd given him guff.

_"You don't move your ass off Ms Sloane's desk and it'll damn well be too sore to ever sit in one of my planes again, boy."_

At _Ms Sloane's desk_ had been the first place she'd ever kissed him, too. That night, once Wantagh and Company had drunkenly poured themselves into a taxi cab and shoved off.

She smiled at the memory, putting her palm to his chest and fiddling open a button. "I can't… Training costs more than I've got."

"Being the best isn't cheap but we'll make it work, Jack. That's been the plan, anyhow."

"You can't afford it either," she murmured, kissing his cheek.

"Who says?" he asked sharply, head turning so fast that she had to jerk her jaw back. "You're gonna land that plane tomorrow, Sparrowhawk. Then I'm puttin' your ass on a train the next day."

 _Sparrowhawk_. God, he knew _exactly_ what he did to her.

Training with him in the dual seat Seversky had been child’s play in comparison to the Curtiss F9 that sat proudly out front of the hangar. The Sparrowhawk was a single seat bi-plane, a compact fighter plane that was all spit and gusto. He’d been using it as a carrot in her training, always dangling it a little farther forward to keep her on point and attentive. She’d been craving the day he’d let her go up alone for weeks, aching for the chance to prove to him (and herself) that she could do it.

Obviously, when it came to him, she didn’t need to prove anything. Which was sweet as hell.

"Speaking of trains…?" Her eyes went round with chagrin and a sugary smile, nostrils flaring slightly as she tried not to laugh at herself.

Gibbs grinned in response and she finally bathed in its comfort. "Missed yours?"

She nodded as his hands curled her face, slightly calloused palms on her cheeks and lifting so that he could watch her eyes as she spoke. "Can I stay? If you'll have me?"

"I'll have you," he whispered. And she had known, somehow, that those were the words he would say. She could feel them sitting on her own tongue before he’d even spoken them, could remember the exact weight of each syllable. She blinked at the familiarity and he squinted, still holding her face still as he kissed her lightly and then nodded. "We've been here before."

"You left in the morning, though."

He shook his head slowly, eyes never leaving hers. "Not this time. Not goin' anywhere."

***

“What if I crash the Curtiss?”

He groaned, eyes still shut against waking and a slight ache in his arm from the way she’d been pushed up his side, his bicep her pillow. “You _won’t_.”

The promise of her lips under his ear was almost as warmly welcoming as the feel of her bare breasts against him as they curled under a quilt. “But what if I do?”

“Probably put Lola nose down right next to you.”

It had been the first and only answer he’d had. Especially now, knowing what it felt like to be with her, emotionally and physically, fully. Now that he knew the taste of her moan as she came around him (though it felt as though he'd known it, tasted her, before). Now that he'd woken up beside her, with her body pressed hot and happy against his side, her hand teasing persistently between his thighs.

“No pressure though, huh?” she asked, fingertips leaving his thigh only long enough to brush his stomach and then rake back down.

“You’re a pilot, Jack.” He answered, his eyes closed once more, enjoying the full flat of her palm as she massaged down against the knee he'd once jammed up on a jump. “Trust me, huh? I know ‘em when I see them.”

“Do I make you happy?”

He frowned as she walked her fingertips back up him, her palm gone flat to his stomach as she shifted and stretched up higher on his side. Gibbs lifted his head, squinting to meet the openly interested and beautifully innocent way she was watching him. “What’s in your head? Why would you even ask that after last night?”

“I think I do. I think that’s why,” she beamed, shrugging a bare shoulder and making blonde waves bounce and sway around her face. _Damn_ , she was beautiful. “Why we keep repeating things.”

He'd happily live his life over a thousand times more if it was with her. “Well, I’d agree with you but the F9 doesn’t have a second seat to fit your ego.”

He chuckled when she just squealed in annoyance and gave him a thump in the face with his own damn pillow. Her hands both gave him an abrupt shove as she got up, flicking the quilt back hard and making him flinch in the sudden chill.

Hell, it was about time they were outta bed anyhow.

She had a plane to fly.


End file.
